


A Life Within

by jenstraflintlocked



Series: Kids Today...and Tomorrow. And Yesterday. [1]
Category: Doctor Who
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-10
Updated: 2020-05-10
Packaged: 2021-03-02 20:08:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,125
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24112552
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jenstraflintlocked/pseuds/jenstraflintlocked
Summary: Jenny is pregnant with Jaspar (they just don't know he's Jaspar yet)
Relationships: Jenny Flint/Madame Vastra
Series: Kids Today...and Tomorrow. And Yesterday. [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1726585
Comments: 6
Kudos: 26





	A Life Within

**Author's Note:**

> written as recompense for A Deep Breath Out cos I made people cry and I'm Soft and I felt bad.
> 
> The scene with Vastra making the hole in the wall by dint of Strax just absolutely RUNNING through it is thebardcall's scene I loved it so in it went.

It’d been fine at first. More than fine. It was exhilarating and fantastic and she’d hugged Vastra so hard and she couldn’t really believe it, even when it was the third month and the Doctor’s sonic screwdriver had confirmed what three missed periods had told her. The gene-spliced egg had taken and was growing. The Doctor and Yaz had promised to throw a baby shower, a name which had confused Strax slightly. Vastra had to put a stop to the Doctor giving advice on parenthood, to which the Doctor protested that she _had_ been a dad.

The Irregulars weren’t jealous which Jenny had been strangely nervous about but then again half of them were grown up themselves now. Parker had been overjoyed if slightly unsure as to how it had come about. His wife had just nodded knowingly and offered to help out more, with a rather ominous “you’ll be needing all the help you can get”. Strax was banned from mentioning lactic fluid ever again under pain of something that Vastra wasn’t sure what it would be apart from it would be very painful. That was all fine. The usual chaotic wonderfulness that passed in 13 Paternoster Row.

They’d started redecorating one of the spare rooms for the baby, Jenny having an immensely wonderful time with Strax building a cot out of the dismantled bed. Vastra had attempted to crochet a blanket, using the hooks that Jenny had “bought” so long ago now. It was even more awful than Jenny’s first attempts but Vastra had just bought more wool and practiced until she was able to make four, dark blue, vivid green, sunny yellow and deep purple. For the baby would want more than one, if had Silurian genes, it would get cold, she reasoned when Jenny tried to stop her making a fifth one the colour of the TARDIS.

They didn’t know what gender it was, and it didn’t matter. It was a child. It was alive within her. She felt its kicks with awe and hurried to find Vastra and pressed her hand to Jenny’s stomach and then Jenny pressed her lips against Vastra’s. Later, the kicks got a little more tiresome and occasionally terrifying. Because there was a life within her. And it was growing. And Jenny grew with it until George had to make her a range of special dresses that she could let out easily as and when she needed to. And then it grew to the point where she had trouble getting up the stairs at night. Or whenever she wanted a lie down, which was becoming increasingly frequent. The sofa was not always comfortable, being unsuited for lounging on. Several times Vastra lost Jenny only to find her in the Plant Room, relaxing in the wicker chair. 

Vastra put her considerable mind to the problem and came up with a solution. They never used the dining room anyway, apart from for psychic journeys. She ordered Strax and Parker Junior to help her shift the large table all the way to the back of the room and then set about building a new bed. A queen-sized bed, big enough for all three of them. Jenny knew nothing of this plan until she woke up from a nap in the wicker chair and came back into the house to the sound of hammering and screws turning. After smiling fondly at the sight of Vastra in a pair of loose trousers and one of Jenny’s old shirts, busy fixing the slats to the centre beam, Jenny tried to remind her wife that it was alright. That she was perfectly capable of walking up the stairs, even if it was a bit more difficult.

“You’re bein’ ridiculous, my love. Look! I’ll prove it see?” Jenny walked, a little more slowly than she’d previously been able to, to the bottom of the stairs but Vastra was quicker and had already blocked the way.

“And what if you fell down them? Hm? I have read that this a primary cause of miscarriage.” Vastra folded her arms.

Jenny protested but not a great deal because the expression on Vastra’s face made her heart melt. She’d merely allowed herself to be ushered back to the sofa and tucked in with a blanket and a kiss.

Vastra had been reading a lot of books recently on human pregnancy. The Doctor had brought her an entire pile. So to pass the time whilst her wife grunted and heaved her way through getting the large mattress through the doorway, Jenny leafed through them. Vastra had a point and Jenny could still remember her own mother, dying in childbirth. Her father, lying drunk afterwards, never fully recovering again. Perhaps caution was the way. She paid particular attention to exercises she could do, gentle ones, just to keep her moving a little and tried them out.

Eventually she got bored and went to watch Vastra making up the bed with new sheets and blankets, her hands resting on top of her protruding stomach.

“There.” Vastra gestured proudly at it. “Just in time for you to go to sleep.” She came over and laid both of her hands on top of Jenny’s, kissing her gently.

“Be needin’ a bath before that, my love.” Jenny grinned at her, waiting for her wife to figure it out.

“Of course.” Vastra glanced down at herself. “I could do with one myself.” She walked through the door and managed two steps before she swore softly to herself. It sounded like a muttered ‘fuck’. Jenny bit her lip to stop herself laughing.

“The bed’s lovely though my darlin’. Saves me that journey at least and will be far more comfortable than the sofa if I wants a lie down.” She rubbed Vastra’s back, the Silurian looked so disappointed. “Come on. Help me up ‘em.” She slipped her arm around Vastra’s. Grateful for the task, Vastra helped her up the two flights of steps, one at a time, Jenny leaning on her and hauling on the banister.

“Gonna be tall this one.” Jenny gasped, resting a few steps from the top. “Definitely your child.”

“I should hope so!” Vastra said a little tartly. “Unless you spliced Strax’s genes accidentally.”

“Definitely not ma’am.” Jenny rolled her eyes and stood, a little breathless at the top of the stairs, Vastra standing behind her making sure she didn’t fall back down. “Right. Bath time.”

Vastra helped her bathe, which was useful because Jenny and her feet were now in a long-distance relationship. She led back and put her feet up on the edge of the bath, whilst Vastra perched on the edge, taking one foot at a time into her lap and gently massaging them. The temptation to tug her foot back and make Vastra topple into the bath was one Jenny resisted until after the massages were nearly complete. She threw her head back and laughed as Vastra tried to save herself and ended up sprawled across the end of the bath.

“That wasn’t funny! What if I’d fallen on you hm?”

“I was countin on the reflexes of a Silurian warrior.” Jenny shrugged. “Never failed me before.”

“Well just be more careful!” Vastra admonished her as she helped Jenny up and out the bath and into a warm towel, taking the opportunity to hug Jenny tightly. After all, she was already wet and was about to have a bath anyway, so it mattered little if she got even damper.

Jenny sat, drying her hair, watching Vastra bathe. She motioned the Silurian to shift round so Jenny could massage her head crests with her special bathing oil.

“We’re gonna be muvvers.” Jenny whispered, pressing her forehead against Vastra’s. She’d never really imagined it before; children had never seemed possible. But her belly was too large to be impossible now and the revelation struck her at least once a day. She’d fretted over whether they’d be good mothers. If it would fit with their lifestyle. But their lifestyle was a choice, and this was just another choice and their life would be adapted to fit. Like a sudden downstairs bedroom.

“Come, my dear. Time for bed.” Vastra dried herself off quickly, shooed Jenny out of her cocoon of towels and into her nightdress and they sat on their old bed, whilst Vastra gently combed Jenny’s hair. She’d always thought hair was a ridiculous thing on apes, but Jenny’s delighted her. She plaited it, to keep it from getting in Jenny’s face whilst she slept and then they reversed the journey they’d made up. Vastra was silent, as she sometimes was, but Jenny side-eyed her because she knew Vastra’s silences and this was a silence that had a plot somewhere within it. She refrained from asking because it was late, and she wanted to sleep and quite frankly she could do with not knowing what the plot was.

It wasn’t that big a surprise therefore, when she woke the next morning, feeling an odd draught on her face and opened her eyes to find an empty bed and a hole in the wall. Raising herself awkwardly on her elbow she could see Vastra standing just beyond it, holding a blueprint. Sitting up revealed Strax, spade at the ready, about to dig a hole.

“Strax!” Vastra called suddenly, turning the blueprint round.

“Yes Madame?”

“…I think I might’ve chosen the wrong wall.”

“Well I’ve run through it now Madame!” Strax gestured with his shovel, narrowly missing Vastra’s elbow.

Jenny fell backwards and burst out laughing at the antics of her wife and her best friend.

It was agreed that specialists would be called in, and Jenny sat on the bed with Vastra, watching as the workmen were harried by Strax into working at a furious pace. Occasionally she sent her wife off to get something she was craving. A fish pie. An apple. Vastra had a moment’s difficulty in procuring “the strange fruit we had that time when we were in Japan” but the Doctor had said Vastra could psychically link to her psychic paper and leave a message. Vastra got a stern talking to about it being “for emergencies Vastra!” but the Silurian argued that Jenny needed to eat so technically it was.

“Everything to do with Jenny is an emergency for you at the moment isn’t it.” The Doctor eyed the hastily rebuilt wall.

Jenny was snoozing idly on what the Doctor had called a small mountain of pillows that Vastra had kept bringing her. The Doctor watched as Vastra draped another blanket across, adding to the multicoloured planes at the foot of the mountain.

“You have to relax too, Vastra. I know you’re nervous. Of course you are. It’s something completely brand new and wonderful and amazing. But you’ll be no help to Jenny if you wear yourself out helping her.” The Doctor came to stand in front of her and squeezed her arms.

Vastra smiled. “There is no danger of that Doctor. But I see your point. I shall take care too.”

They both stared at Jenny for a moment.

“You’re both going to be such wonderful mothers.” The Doctor said softly, returning her hands to their respective pockets and rocking back on her heels slightly.

“Mm.” Vastra hummed her agreement. “It is a gift beyond anything I ever considered when you saved me from that tunnel. All those years in the circus, so much bitterness. It all rather melts away.”

“Have you considered what it will be like for the child? In this era?” The Doctor asked, in the same soft voice.

“Of course.” Vastra’s answering voice was hard. “But we will cross that when we come to it. There are…favours I could ask of you, in the future.”

“I imagine so. And I’d have no problem granting any request you make.”

“It’s a conversation to have with Jenny. After all, we don’t even know what this child will look like. Whether it would even need to hide.”

“And if it does?”

“I will not let my child grow up under a veil. I chose that. But as I said. Conversations to be had with Jenny after the birth.” Vastra went to Jenny’s side, hearing her wife stir and stroked her hair until she sank back into sleep. “It will be our biggest adventure, no matter what happens.”

The tenderness in Vastra’s voice and smile made the Doctor cough and hastily make her excuses, promising once more to throw a baby shower. “We’ll decide then, ey?” she flung over her shoulder as she left.

“Whatever we decide, doesn’t matter. We shall decide what is best for our child, and we shall decide together.” Vastra murmured, pressing a kiss to Jenny’s forehead before curling up beside her.


End file.
